Friday, 27 January 2012

Bye bye parakeets, hola Canaries

Both my readers will have noticed I’ve been away. Away from the internet that is, but not away from running. And as any Eastenders scriptwriter knows, there’s nothing like a bit of suspense to crank up your followers, and hopefully also my sponsorship total.

So while I have been away from scribbling, I’ve still been notching up the miles. In fact I’ve been finishing most runs exhilarated, as if I’ve achieving something.

My cousin’s stepfather is a veteran marathoner. He lives in Finland, a land hardly known for it’s temperate weather. yet he’s never done the London marathon. Why? He doesn’t want to train in the winter. Granted, the London winter has nothing on a Finnish one, but the dark, dank February days recently threatened to cramp my style.

Loving running in London in rainy February is a bit like loving your partner after they’ve put on four stone (no, I don’t mean you). Ought to be doable but must try harder. So much as I love our great city, I’ve went for Plan B and am running for a week in Gran Canaria.

What’s not to like? Four hour Easy Jet flight. No time difference. Sun, sea and some great potential training runs.

It seems I’m in good company and have met some others training for the 2012 London Marathon on the stunning coastal route that runs from San Augustin to Playa del Ingis.

San Augustin

This morning as on every other morning since arriving, I joined the other joggers and runners. We’re a disparate group, mostly (I’m guessing) late 40s and up, lots of Germans and Brits breaking a sweat, and trying out broken Spanish.

As quite a few of my support crew are here with me, I’ve been able to train without buggy or dog for the first time. Which means I have been able to use my arms. What a difference an arm or two make.

Those visualisation experiments have paid off. I’ve stopped stopping, which is great. Still slow, but keep telling myself it isn’t about speed, it’s about stamina.

One thing that has helped my stamina enormously have been the excellent AudioFuel Long Run training programmes. If you’re not yet familiar with audiofuel, check out their new range of training programmes, Run Faster, coached by 4 times world Ironman champion Chrissie Wellington. She runs a 2:44 marathon. After a 3.8k swim & 180k ride.